Sunday, June 24, 2012

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is
love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23
gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

One of
our distinctives as a congregation is what we have labeled Sunny Calvinism.
What do we mean by the label? Just this – Calvinism, rightly understood, is
nothing but the declaration, as Spurgeon once said, that salvation is of the
Lord.

Salvation
– the glorious glad tidings that though we rebelled against our Creator and
brought upon ourselves and all creation ruin and destruction, God acted to
deliver us from our folly and rescue all creation from the darkness of death. He sent His Son to bear the punishment
for our sin; He raised up His Son
victorious over the grave; He gave
His Son, as the Exalted Ruler over all creation, the right to pour out the
Spirit and renew the face of the earth. What we could not do, weak as we were, God did.

But there’s
more. After all, for all these glorious things to apply to us individually
something more must happen. God doesn’t just set up some mechanism of salvation
and then say to us – OK, put the coin in the slot and pull the lever and make
it work. No! Salvation – the renewal of all creation and the renewal of each of
us individually – is of the Lord. Each of us by nature is a child of wrath,
devoted to the service of other gods, selfish, self-centered, worshiping the
creature rather than the Creator. We are, as Paul announces, dead in our
trespasses and sins – unable to rescue ourselves from our folly, unwilling to
turn from our sin and embrace Christ. Christ’s death on the cross, His
resurrection to the right hand of God – neither would benefit us if not for the
illumination of the Spirit. God must make us willing to turn from our sin and
turn to Jesus. So if you are in Jesus, if you believe in Him and rest on Him
for forgiveness and newness of life, then God has done this for you. Though you
were stubbornly set against God by nature, by grace He has given you new life.

So what
ought to be our response? Joy! Rejoicing! Delight! Sunny Calvinism. The fruit
of the Spirit is joy. God has rescued us; God has done that which we were not
able to do for ourselves; so how can we be anything but joyful?

And not
only this – not only has God rescued and redeemed us – we know that our
Sovereign Lo rd governs all things and holds us and all things in His hands.
Whatever the Lord pleases he does – in heaven and on earth, in the seas and in
all deeps. He is sovereign. Salvation is of
the Lord – the One who holds us in His hand and whose purposes none can
thwart. God is on our side, not one hair falls from our head apart from our
Father determination - so ought we not to be joyful?

But
often rather than reflecting such joy – joy that we have been redeemed, joy
that God has us right where He has us for some good purpose – we grumble,
complain, grow sour, live anxiously. So let us kneel and confess our sin to the
Lord.

Our God
and Father,

You have
been good and kind. Not only did you Create us in your own image but you
Redeemed us through sending Your Son as the propitiation for our sins. You give
us Your Spirit that we might believe in you, love you, cherish you, worship
you. Yet we have responded to your grace with fear, anxiety, worry, grumbling,
complaint rather than with joy and thankfulness. Forgive us and bring forth the
fruit of joy in our lives. Through Christ our Lord,